June 27, 2018 — Fishermen and seafood harvesters may take a major trade hit with the announcement of new tariffs from China, though the details still aren’t clear.
The country announced new tariffs on a broad cross-section of American seafood products on June 15 in response to a U.S tariff hike on imported Chinese products. If the tariffs are approved, China will apply a 25 percent tax to items like Pacific salmon, cod, Alaska pollock, flatfish, crab, shellfish and other commonly exported seafoods.
China is a major trade partner for the Alaskan seafood industry. Processors regularly ship salmon that have been headed and gutted to China to finish the processing and packaging before being re-exported to the rest of the world. China is also a major consumer of seafood products within its borders, and a 25 percent tariff could push down imports.
It’s possible the tariffs won’t be implemented at all, or there may be exceptions, said Garrett Evridge, an economist with the McDowell Group.
“At this point, there’s a lot of outstanding information that we’re still trying to get our fingers on,” he said. “It’s actually unclear as to whether re-exported seafood is going to be excluded.”
According to an announcement from the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute, multiple contacts in China have indicated that customs officials would exclude products intended for reprocessing and export.
“It is not yet clear how product entering China will be differentiated between export and domestic consumption upon entry or at what point a tariff and/or credit will be applied,” the June 22 announcement states. “This is a developing situation and ASMI will continue to provide updates as information becomes available.”
The Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute has maintained a Chinese office in Hong Kong since 1997. On a recent trade mission to China, Gov. Bill Walker took several representatives of the seafood industry with him specifically to build relationships between Chinese and American companies for seafood trade.